Last time we left our
supposedly sneaky orc Shush’Ogar, he had stumbled out of jail, collected
skulls, stumbled out of goblin caves, witnessed the assassination of an
emperor, and stumbled out of a sewer. The moment when you walk out from the
tutorial into the light of a wide-open world to explore is always great in
Bethesda games. An interesting thing to note about Oblivion is that though you
can go anywhere and do as you like at this point, the game starts you off
pointed straight at a dungeon. Specifically, an ancient ruin named Vilverin.
There’s a sleeping
bandit right out of view behind the wall. I know this dungeon uncomfortably
well.
This dungeon was one of
the first things I experienced playing an Elder Scrolls game, and I wager the
same was true for many others. It’s a good introductory dungeon too, as it has
a fair bit of variety and can make you an obscene amount of money for a level
one character. As such, it’s been an unofficial tradition of mine to plunder
the place as my first independent act with new characters. Now dungeons can be
kind of same-y and lacking in unique commentary, so we’ll skip or summarize
some in this play-through. But for at least this first one, I’ll make an
exception.
